ASUS's 32X/12X/40X CD-RW Drive

While many of us look forward to the day when we can replace our old CD burners with DVD burners, the sad fact is that the things are still too pricey for most folks. CD-RW drives still offer plenty of capacity without the drives or the media costing an arm and a leg. If you're in the market for a new CD burner, ASUSTeK let us know about its new CRW-3212A 32x Writing/12x Rewriting/40x Reading CD-RW drive. The new drive makes use of ASUS's FlextraLink technology, which is supposed to keep buffer underrun problems from causing you grief. It also includes the company's FlextraSpeed technology, which monitors the recording media and picks the appropriate writing speed, and uses ASUS DDSS II, which is supposed to minimize the vibration caused by the spindle motor and resonance between components as well as the drive and PC cases. ASUS says the drive can burn a full 650 MB CD in 3 1/2 minutes, and will be shipping in quantities starting in mid-January.